L'Histoire du soldat

L'Histoire du soldat (The Soldier's Tale) is a theatrical work "to be read, played, and danced" ("lue, jouée et dansée") by three actors and one or several dancers, accompanied by a septet of instruments. The piece was conceived by Igor Stravinsky and Swiss writer C. F. Ramuz based on a Russian folk tale (The Runaway Soldier and the Devil) drawn from the collection of Alexander Afanasyev.

The libretto relates the parable of a soldier who trades his fiddle to the devil in return for unlimited economic gain. The music is scored for a septet of violin, double bass, clarinet, bassoon, cornet (often played on trumpet), trombone, and percussion, and the story is told by three actors: the soldier, the devil, and a narrator, who also takes on the roles of minor characters. A dancer plays the non-speaking role of the princess, and there may also be additional ensemble dancers.

The original French text by Ramuz has been translated into English by Michael Flanders and Kitty Black, and into German by Hans Reinhart.

The Soldier

The Soldier or The Soldiers may refer to:

See also

The Soldier (film)

The Soldier (Codename: The Soldier in the UK) is a 1982 American Cold War action film directed by James Glickenhaus and starring Ken Wahl. The film also features Klaus Kinski, Alberta Watson and a cameo by country music superstar George Strait.

Plot

Renegade KGB agents hijack a plutonium shipment inside the United States and use it to plant a nuclear device in the Saudi Arabian Ghawar oilfield. They threaten to detonate it, thereby contaminating 50% of the world's oil reserve, unless Israel withdraws its settlements from the West Bank. The fact that the KGB is behind this threat is unknown, as the culprits are believed by the Israelis and Americans to be Islamic fundamentalist extremists. The American president contemplates starting a war with Israel, in order to save the world from oil crisis. The director of the CIA offers the president an alternative solution.

A CIA agent codenamed The Soldier (Ken Wahl), working outside the usual channels, is assigned to the case. After Russian agent Dracha (Klaus Kinski) attempts to terminate him, he contacts the CIA director from the US embassy in Berlin. A KGB agent assassinates the director and frames The Soldier for his murder, leaving no official knowledge of his activities other than the president, who has disavowed any knowledge of his actions. On the run from his own government, he seeks refuge in the Israeli embassy. He and his team cooperate with the Israeli Mossad, represented by their director of covert operations Susan Goodman (Alberta Watson). Meanwhile, the president authorizes military action against Israel.

The Soldier (poem)

If I should die, think only this of me:
That there's some corner of a foreign field
That is for ever England. There shall be
In that rich earth a richer dust concealed;
A dust whom England bore, shaped, made aware,
Gave, once, her flowers to love, her ways to roam,
A body of England's, breathing English air,
Washed by the rivers, blest by suns of home.

And think, this heart, all evil shed away,
A pulse in the eternal mind, no less
Gives somewhere back the thoughts by England given;
Her sights and sounds; dreams happy as her day;
And laughter, learnt of friends; and gentleness,
In hearts at peace, under an English heaven.

"The Soldier" is a poem written by Rupert Brooke. The poem is the fifth of a series of poems entitled 1914.

It is often contrasted with Wilfred Owen's 1917 antiwar poem Dulce Et Decorum Est. The manuscript is located at King's College, Cambridge.

Structure of poem

This poem was written at the beginning of the First World War in 1914, as part of a series of sonnets written by Rupert Brooke. Brooke himself, predominantly a prewar poet, died the year after “The Soldier” was published. “The Soldier”, being the conclusion and the finale to Brooke’s ‘1914’ war sonnet series, deals with the death and accomplishments of a soldier.